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Man, Volpe gets crucified (not here, mind you, but elsewhere) for having the grapes to say publicly what at least a fair number of Liberals are thinking, and people wonder why party members are reluctant to go on the record. Well, I mean, of course they don’t wonder. But if you’re gonna label someone a traitor for speaking their mind publicly, you can’t very well expect all these senior Liberal insiders to be terribly forthcoming.

Chantal Hebert gives the Liberals great advice in her column out today. Turn the page on the Trudeau legacy and accept Quebec’s distinctiveness and tack back to the right towards the center. I couldn’t agree more.

She doesn’t mention Michael Ignatieff by name but his name is plastered in between every line. She ends her column with a merciless jab at Dion. The next time the Liberals have to pick a bilingual candidate. Ouch!

Iggy or Manley or somebody who can straddle the center. That’s the prescription.

May and Dion alternating in a “Harper’s a liar” refrain is an image that I retain from this campaign. The left is not where’s it’s at these days, the electorate has spoken.

Bill Curry has story about how E May is in trouble with some Green supporters. Three people, on the record, said May’s leadership should come under some scrutiny. Particularly her public musings on strategic.

I would argue that keeping internal party politics out of the media is a good idea but if you are going to take your dissatisfaction public, at least don’t be a coward about it and let the reporters attribute the quotes.

Volpe was brave to say what he did because there will be lots of people who will now hate him and think he’s a traitor to the party.

Just heard Gerard Kennedy taking the high road in his first interview (CBC Radio) since the election.
Urging Dion to take his time – expressing NO regret for his king-making back 2 1/2 years ago (would do it again) and talking about trying a new approach to communications for the party.
Put me down for a member of the conspiracy theory that Kennedy / Trudeau want Dion to hang on to the reins for as long as possible – even as interim leader – so they can get their fund raising under way…Ahem – where do I send my $1,000 Gerard…?

I’m going to violate Wells’ Nth Law of Canadian Politics (that everything tends towards the most boring possible conclusion) and suggest that neither Rae nor Ignatieff will be the next leader.

For one thing, as soon as the campaign begins, they’re going to start reminding everyone why they didn’t win the leadership in the first place (Ignatieff: arrogant, Iraq; Rae: carpetbagger, Ontario).

For another thing, a bitter tilt between two heavyweights is going to remind a lot of people of another bitter tilt between two heavyweights, both of whom became Prime Minister, but who destroyed the party in the process.

When you examine the Liberal Party’s history, they always have their best success when governing from the centre. Look at the Chretien years – he gave prominent positions to business Liberals all over his cabinet, and in a very Clinton-esque manner brazenly stole the most attractive policy planks from Reform. (I say that more out of admiration than malice – it was very artfully done.) Sure, Chretien threw the occasional bone to the progressive wing of the party, but by positioning himself where he did, Chretien was able to move the Liberal brand “upscale”, if you will, squeezing out Reform/CA and the PCs while still managing to keep his own base intact.

Along comes Paul Martin, who inexplicably decided to mess with a winning formula, trying to move the party a step to the left. I still remember his nauseating plea to NDP voters, saying that Liberals and New Democrats were children of the same mother or some such drivel. Yeah, that worked well.

It worked so well that Stephane Dion tried to do even more of it, openly cutting a deal with the Greens and moving the party even further to left, completely isolating the few remaining business Liberals still left in the Party. We all saw the result on Tuesday.

If the Liberals want to win, they’ll go with someone like Manley or Ignatieff. (I would agree wholly with the sentiment that Manley is the candidate who might frighten the Tories the most.) If they want to allow the Conservatives to become the new de facto governing party, they’ll keep tacking left.

boudica, care to expand on that? I’m slightly to the right of center, did not vote for the Conservatives (or the Liberals) in the most recent election, and would consider voting for a Manley-led (or McKenna-led) Liberal party, where I would never vote for a Rae-, Kennedy-, or Dion-led party.

I’m probably gonna get flamed for this, but here’s the thing–Canada follows, never leads. We are the Japanese of the European diaspora. Our governments have been drifting rightwards for three decades. The new centre is the old right. The world is heading in a new direction soon, because the trend that started with Reaghan in the U.S. and Thatcher in Britain has run its course. Leftards, with newly burnished edges, are in the ascendancy. It will doubtless not happen in Canada for at least two years, maybe four, but it will happen. Heck, Harper is already drifting left.

I think you are right. Because the right was divided while Chretch was winning his majorities, it seems the Liberals think it is easy, you just need the right guy. The next few years will convince them otherwise, if they survive……..

For the first time, I agree with kody. Canada is not drifting rightward—-the fact that the Liberals bled to both the right AND the left puts paid to that argument–but the Liberals definitely disappoint with this cannibalistic feeding frenzy.

After this spectacle, do you really think that Manley would even want the job?

Andrew E, did you miss the whole episode where Manley was instrumental in allowing Harper to go unscatheed on the Afghan mission situation? Mind you, Iggy helped Manley a great deal on this but the fact remains that Manley accepted to assist Harper knowing full well that it would inoculate him against any LPC offensive.

I say that he knew full well because he would have to be a complete imbecile to not understand that.

So there you have it. Either Manley deliberately sabotaged his party or he’s an imbecile.

For one thing, as soon as the campaign begins, they’re going to start reminding everyone why they didn’t win the leadership in the first place (Ignatieff: arrogant, Iraq; Rae: carpetbagger, Ontario).

Back in 2006, I thought that Ignatieff’s sympathy for a lot of Conservative positions meant that he’d be a bad leader, since it meant he wouldn’t have as much room to attack them. Then came this election, when I think the opposite would’ve been true, too: Conservatives wouldn’t have had as much room to attack Ignatieff on a lot of issues, either. That would’ve left them to fight on things like “leadership” and their respective party’s brands, and in that kind of scenario…I’m not saying Ignatieff would’ve won, but I think it would’ve ended up being a lot closer (especially if those 600k or so Liberal voters who stayed home had been compelled to go out and vote)…

john g: “How can Harper attack the guy after choosing him to lead the Afghan task force?” Same as he attacked Dion after Dion pushed through basically both men’s signature piece of legislation, the Clarity Act.

The Libs don’t need the tory votes (which are hard to budge) as much as they need all the leftie votes back. From an NDP point of view, Ignatieff would be fantastic because then there would be two clearly right wing parties vs. only one left (well except the Greens, but who knows where they are).

boudica, as far as I can see, the Liberal and Conservative platforms on Afghanistan ended up being the same, and it’s hard to imagine that the election would have turned out differently if Manley had stayed on the sidelines. So unless you’re already a rabid card-carrying Liberal who was desperately offended by Manley’s move for partisan reasons (and if so, who are you going to vote for anyway?), it’s at least as easily forgettable by the electorate as, say, the fact that Ignatieff has lived most of his adult life outside of Canada and refers to himself together with Americans as “we”.

Boudica is a better illustration of where Liberal heads are at, on the Manley Question, than Andrew E. is. Manley has zero chance of being accepted as a Liberal by Liberals. This says more about them than him, and it astonishes Liberals who used to work with Chrétien, who liked to win; but knowing it’s true, Manley won’t be a candidate for the leadership.

kody: I don’t think anyone considers it Harper’s job to smear the newly minted leader of the oppositions with ads attacking his character when there was no election campaign. That went seriously beyond the pale.

“boudica, as far as I can see, the Liberal and Conservative platforms on Afghanistan ended up being the same, and it’s hard to imagine that the election would have turned out differently if Manley had stayed on the sidelines. So unless you’re already a rabid card-carrying Liberal who was desperately offended by Manley’s move for partisan reasons (and if so, who are you going to vote for anyway?), it’s at least as easily forgettable by the electorate as, say, the fact that Ignatieff has lived most of his adult life outside of Canada and refers to himself together with Americans as “we”.

Andrew E, for starters, I no longer consider myself a Liberal. I came to the LPC because of Dion and I’m leaving the LPC because of what they are doing to Dion. Not because I have a hero-worship thing for Dion but because with him gone so are any hopes of having the LPC bring in a much needed environmental agenda on Parliament Hill.

As for Manley not affecting the outcome of this election, that might be true but we will never know, will we? If this election had been about Afghanistan and if Iggy (that man hasn’t met a war he didn’t want to get into)hadn’t gotten his way and if Manley would have told Harper to stick where the sun doesn’t shine… if, if, if…

It really doesn’t much matter what the final outcome was in the end. For me, the fact that Manley sabotaged his own party on the Afghan mission disqualifies him for the job.

That being said, now that I have tossed my membership card in the recycling bin, I really don’t care anymore.

As the goulish vulturelike powermongers gather above Dion’s carcass and feed on his political flesh,

I suspect there are more than a few highly qualified individuals sought to lead the Liberal party looking on in horror and thinking “but for the grace of God go I”, as they respectfully decline taking on the role of future political carcass.

I also suspect that those enabling the feeding frenzy realize this, but they simply cannot help themselves.

Nice metaphor, kody, and you sustained it over the whole post! (Technically it’s sharks, not vultures, that go into a feeding frenzy; “ghoulish”; “there but for the grace of God” but I hate to quibble over this outstanding effort. Keep up the good work!)

Did anyone notice the strange smile Turner had on his face when interviewed and the strangely vagueish – I won’t ‘ interfear ‘ with the executives work or some such – ouch! of all people you would think he might want to help Dion – good grief!

but after that it’ll be one big party-crossing conservative/red tory love-fest.

Expect a wedge issue to be brought up by Harper in the next six to eight weeks. Liberal infighting over Dion’s poor treatment and corresponding infighting for the next leadership job will also grease the skids so to speak.

Crossing the floor on “principle” is always so much more palatable than an oblique grab for power.

It is noteworthy that the man the Liberal party is publicly destroying as we speak,

lead every single Liberal MP sitting in Parliament to power.

The blast radius on the bomb being dropped on Dion right now is much wider than folks realize. If the Libs don’t think they’ll lose some “friendlies” in the collateral damage they’re kidding themselves.

At the first Liberal caucus meeting, you can guarantee that many nervous glances will be shared, as people wonder to themselves if any of their colleagues has been thinking about bolting.

It would not be entirely dissimilar to what Chretien did in the late 90s, picking off PC MPs while Joe Clark looked on helplessly. Chretien didn’t even need the votes in the House – he simply saw an opportunity to put the boots to a potential rival for centrist votes, and did the deed. He was completely ruthless that way, which is why he was so effective.

Unlike kody I am not confident that you would ever see any mass defections. I am pretty sure, however, that all of us could name at least a few Liberal MPs who might consider it under the right circumstances.

In the United States there’s this concept called “shifting the goalposts”. It’s what happens when a center-left party tries moving to the right.

Those bleating about “the center” might want to look it up sometime. Including you, Paul. No Liberal is ever going to outflank the Conservatives on the right. Even Manley.

(The worst part about the Liberal loss is that they, and the predictably vacuous commentariat, seem to think that the solution is to use the tactics that failed the Dems over and over again from 1994 to 2004. You’d think people who live so close to America would learn from it.)

Tomorrow, Monday, October 20th, I want to see and hear Stephane Dion proclaiming that he intends to hold on to the Liberal leadership to fight fight fight that “rightwing, neocon, climate change denier Stephen Harper who does not represent Canadian values”.

65% of Canadians did not vote for Stephen Harper and the Conservatives, and that is a majority … a MORAL MAJORITY !

I, Stephane Dion as Liberal leader, intend to lead that Moral Majority to stop Stephen Harper and his climate change deniers who would destroy Canada and the World.

I am on a mission of Truth and Hope and nothing can stop me, for I am still the Leader of the Liberal party, the party that I love and respect, and I love Canada too much to give up and quit.

I shall be the leader of the Moral Majority, and I want to unite all those who are opposed to Stephen Harper and the Conservative agenda. Join me in the fight against those who would make Canada unrecognizable and unlivable. I still have hope for a fairer, richer, greener Canada, and we must not abandon our mission to save Canada because the World is watching us.

Ruth: “I, Stephane Dion as Liberal leader, intend to lead that Moral Majority to stop Stephen Harper and his climate change deniers who would destroy Canada and the World.”

Ruth you ar a complete moonbat, but by all means, have at it. If you can get Dion, or the next Liberal leader to stand up and claim that Stephen Harper wants to, or even better can/will destroy the World, I’ll owe you, big time.

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